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LeBron has talked to Kevin Love about playing in Cleveland

The murmurs continue: LeBron James has reportedly talked to Kevin Love about the possibility of playing together with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Yahoo’s Adrian Wojnarowski and Marc Spears reported the news on Thursday evening.

Love is enthusiastic about the idea of teaming with James on the Cleveland Cavaliers, sources said. James’ decision to sign only a two-year contract that affords him the option of again becoming a free agent at the end of next season has not tempered Love’s interest in joining James on the roster.

The report stated that a deal is still not imminent, but again cited sources on the topic of the Cavs’ willingness to include Andrew Wiggins. An interesting new caveat: A third team would indeed be likely for the deal to make plausible sense. Otherwise, the Cavs would likely be depleting their roster too much.

Golden State remains reluctant to include Klay Thompson in a potential trade for Love. Such a deal with the Warriors — including forward David Lee — would perhaps be a bit more logical. But with LeBron’s persistence, anything can change in a hurry.

We’ll keep you posted on anything new. Although a deal might not happen by the weekend, there’s certain to be continued buzz and updates.

Jacob Rosen is a long-time contributor to WaitingForNextYear. He's also a writer online at SportsAnalyticsBlog and Nylon Calculus . An Akron native, Jacob is a current MBA student at the University of Oregon's Warsaw Sports Marketing Center. You can follow him on Twitter @WFNYJacob or e-mail him at udjrosen(at)gmail(dot)com.

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Not to be a wet blanket — but this is tampering, right? I remember being pretty outraged in 2010 after details came out about those behind-the-scenes recruitment efforts. I’m willing to look the other way here, but the cognitive dissonance is giving me a headache.

Steve

“What we told the owners was that the three players are totally, as our system has evolved, within their rights to talk to each other,” Commissioner David Stern said after the meeting, which was held here in conjunction with the N.B.A. summer league.

Players on different teams who discuss the idea of someday playing together “is not tampering or collusion that is prohibited,”

Players talking to each other is on the up and up. Anonymously sourced reports that players would be ok going to a certain team may be looked down upon, but not much more. Teams cannot talk to or about players currently under contract with another team.

There wasn’t any evidence of tampering in 2010, and there’s no evidence of tampering in this process.

scripty

/Twolves get #1 pick in 2015 and 2017

The_Real_Shamrock

I think things are nearing a fine line though with all of this “talking” among players. Granted it would be pretty tough to make it illegal for players to talk but when it’s obvious that a team is interested in obtaining a certain player and you have players from that team talking to the wanted player it looks bad.

I stand corrected. Thanks for the info. An arbitrary distinction but, hey, hopefully it works in our favor this time.

The_Real_Shamrock

A third team hmmmm is this because Wiggins isn’t signed? I heard Bennett ($5.5M), Wiggins (?), Haywood ($2M) and two first round draft picks was enough. The first round draft picks I think are valued around $2-2.5M each no? Wiggins signs a max rookie deal I think that’s $5.?M.

Cavaliers need to get to Kevin Love ($15.7M). I hate to say it but Varejao’s $9.8M is really the road block if you ask me.

Harv 21

“Tampering” implies interfering with a contract. A contract is between a player and team. A player on another team has no ability to sign the player and interfere, so unless LeBron is pushing Love at the behest of the team (wink wink) by definition there’s no tampering. Every all star game is chock full of “man we gotta join forces” conversations.

The other thing is that contact can be made with the blessing of Minny. Here, they may want to move him but know they can’t get value without the trade partner knowing he’ll sign long term. This requires “tampering,” cajoling, negotiation, the whole works, by the potential trade partner and its players. It’s a necessity for everyone.

Minnesota is going to have to give eventually right? He’s going to end up leaving anyway.

The_Real_Shamrock

All we need is someone to float that the only team KLove signs a new deal with is Cleveland and the pressure will mount even more.

Who’s from Minnesota?

Wow

Yes!

Jack

Now you have it. He’s enthusiastic. If Love says I won’t resign with anyone but CLE if traded, everyone will pull their offers and MN either takes a Wiggins-less offer or let’s him walk.

Trading Wiggins is completely unnecessary.

Natedawg86

Agree. Why would love want to make his new team weaker? We can’t trade wiggins for 30 days after he is signed as well

RGB

NFL training camp can’t get here soon enough…

EastSide

Natedawg, apparently Wiggins has not signed his rookie contract. So the 30-day rule you refer to does not apply. This makes no sense to me (as how can he play in Summer League without a contract) but apparently Wiggins took out an insurance policy instead. I have found ZERO mention of this anywhere, but 2 WFNY readers pointed this out to me earlier this week…I believe they said Windhorst might have reported this? Bizarre.

RGB indicated how he is sick of the LeBron&Love drama by saying he cannot wait until NFL training camp. I reminded him that plenty of drama awaits there with our collaborative JFF-Hoyer QB controversy meme.